IMPERA

Impera is undoubtedly a huge step up from Prequelle if not one of Ghost's best collections period.

All that conceptualising is fine and dandy, but Impera wins on bolshiness, bravado and skyscraping songs alone. Ghost have turned in a modern metal classic with an arena rock heart.

At once striking and surging with complex washes of substantial sonic mass, Impera is a dazzling tour de force.

Impera is GHOST’s most accessible album to date, treading the fine line between greatness and perfection.

His knack for smart riffs and melodies, not to mention his constant itch for experimentation, have rightly made Ghost a leader in mainstream rock, a positive development the genre has sorely lacked for years.

Stark social commentary and a procession of left-field collaborators make for a truly delicious pop-rock proposition.

For lovers of Ghost’s previous output, Impera is a must-have; for everyone else, this is an album so brimming with hubris, uncontrolled boldness, and sky-scraping anthems that it simply can’t be ignored.

Impera’s greatest achievement ... is one so obvious you wonder why Ghost haven’t been mining it for much longer: namely power ballads.

Ghost have never sounded this good.

The result is one of the most spectacular and hook-filled heavy(ish) metal albums in recent memory, so even without the looming sense that Satan is watching, GHOST are still impossible to resist.

Even with all its few holes and enervating moments, Impera does more than enough to prevent Ghost of becoming a parody of itself.

It's bittersweet to see the campy Satanic days firmly behind the band, but any old-school fan should still be proud to see what the band has achieved, and it's clear that Impera is the album Ghost needed to take their career to the next level.

As shiny theatrical melody rock designed to look deceptively dangerous on teenage bedroom walls goes, Impera takes Ghost several more ferula shuffles in the direction of their very own American Idiot.

Metal or not, IMPERA is a success. It’s not a perfect album, nor will it resonate with everyone, but an accessible, engaging occult rock record that explores the cyclical nature of empires by way of both hooks and heft is a record worth my time.